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Study: Test-score gains don’t mean cognitive gains
The Washington Post: In a finding that should give pause to backers of standardized test-based school reform, a new study by neuroscientists at three major universities shows that students who achieved the highest gains on standardized tests did not show the same gains in the ability to analyze material and think logically.
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Can Thinking About Time Make You A Better Person?
Fast Company: Imagine: Briefcases full of cash. Scrooge McDuck diving into his swimming pool vault of gold coins. Winning $100 at a blackjack table. Feeling a little dishonest yet? Just thinking about getting our grubby little hands on some cold hard cash can make us more likely to cheat, according to a new study in Psychological Science. Oddly enough, thinking about time seems to make people more honest.
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Adventures in Experimenting On Toddlers
The Wall Street Journal: The Gopnik lab is rejoicing. My student Caren Walker and I have just published a paper in the well known journal Psychological Science. Usually when I write about scientific papers here, they sound neat and tidy. But since this was our own experiment, I can tell you the messy inside story too. First, the study—and a small IQ test for you. Suppose you see an experimenter put two orange blocks on a machine, and it lights up. She then puts a green one and a blue one on the same machine, but nothing happens. Two red ones work, a black and white combination doesn't. Now you have to make the machine light up yourself.
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The Life of Dan Wegner: A Meeting Place for Joy and Intelligence
Scientific American: Dan Wegner published his last paper here in this edition of Scientific American. It marked the end of a prolific, decades-long career in social psychology—one studded by every major award in the field, over 100 articles, seven books and an endowed professorship at Harvard University. But what the public record does not reveal is how Dan approached science and how that approach influenced his academic progeny. A mere inspection of his CV also misses why it meant so much to him that his final paper would appear here in Scientific American.
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Make Time for Awe
The Atlantic: Jason Silva is a self-described epiphany junkie. He recently enthused to me about how some movies, for example, manage to capture attention and create a complete, immersive transformation for the viewer. In his "Shots of Awe" YouTube series, Silva wants to interrupt your mundane existence with "philosophical espresso shots" designed to inspire you to live to the fullest. It’s easy to get swept away by Silva’s vision of the future: a revolutionary convergence of biotechnology, nanotechnology, and artificial intelligence. He considers awe to be a pivotal ingredient in making ideas resonate.
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Is Affluenza a Real Condition?
Discovery News: When a lawyer argued that a 16-year-old involved in a fatal drunk-driving collision in Texas suffered from “affluenza,” or being so privileged by his rich parents that he wasn’t capable of distinguishing the consequences of bad behavior, many eyebrows were raised. ... While it’s not in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, both Plante and Arizona State University psychology professor Suniya Luthar say they recognize the behavior.
